2010. The year rappers that rots behind bars releases records? Well, yes but T.I. is everything but happy about his current incarceration, which he recently expressed in an official letter on his website, calling the experience a "real ass whoopin’". Eh yeah. But even if things are kinda hard for T.I. right now, that 7th album of his is shaping up pretty nicely. It's now only a week before "No Mercy" hits the shelves the 7th of December and here's two lovely tasters off the "No Mercy"-platter.

First, 'Poppin' Bottles' ft. Drake, besides another great production from T-Minus, the absolute best in this track is without a doubt Tip's line "Imma Fuck you couch, Rick James". Hilarious, always:

Then we have the Alex da Kid-produced 'Castle Walls' featuring Christina Aguilera. Simply wow, just listen:

WOHA! Finally, after weeks of impatient waiting here's the official video for Shy FX's new single 'Raver' featuring Kano, Donae'o & Roses Gabor, the first single from Shy's forthcoming album "Larger Than Life" which will be out next year. B'Raver' will be released as a FREE download next Monday (6th December) alongside remixes from Breakage, MJ Cole, Skream, B.Traits, Attacca Pesante, Benny Page and Shy FX himself:

Yesterday I unleashed First Up!'s wrap up of 2010 starting with five of the best 20 songs and I can promise you one thing, Robyn's 'Dancehall Queen' will be included sometime during the coming Sundays. Still so damn good and watchu know, Robyn just dropped the official video for the track. A cute karaoke mish mash, DHQs included of course. The clip is co-directed by Diplo, Red Foxx & Pomp&Clout:

And like that Diplo and Stenchman remix featuring Spoek Mathmabo that served as the iTunes bonus track for the full "Body Talk" album wasn't more than enough, here's another brilliant one from Mad Decent and Dillon Francis ft. Name Brand. Also look out for Dillon's upcoming 4 track EP that will be dropping on Mad Decent this spring.

Nicki Minaj doesn't save a word, instead she goes all in in her "My Time Now" documentary that premiered on MTV an hour ago and it's honest and real.

Peep the whole thing right here:

Update, since MTV now has disabled the links below for watching in the EU (gotta love the contra productive in country restrictions on the world wide web), here's all 45 minutes divided into three clips, thanks to Yardie:

"I put quality in what I do. I spend time and I spend energy and I spend effort and I spend everything I have, every fiber of my being, to give people quality, Is that wrong? For wanting more for myself, wanting people to treat me with respect?" she continues. "But you know what? Next time, they know better. But had I accepted the pickle juice, I would be drinking pickle juice right now." [...] "When you're a girl, you have to be everything. You have to be dope at what you do but you have to be super sweet and you have to be sexy and you have to be this, you have to be that, and you have to be nice, It's like, 'I can't be all those things at once. I'm a human being."

Mista Jam just premiered it via the airwaves of 1Xtra and the ladies does it again people! FEMALE TAKEOVER aka. Ruff Diamondz, Adot, Envy, Cherri V, Baby Blue, RoxXxan, Lioness, Mz. Bratt & Lady Leshurr all going in over Tinchy Stryder's latest single (off Tinchy's new and third album "Third Strike" that was released the 15th), the Ishi 2Stripes-produced 'Game Over' and yes, it outshines the original and the remix with Ghetts, Slix, Griminal, Dot Rotten, Fuda Guy, Wretch 32, Roachee, Maxsta & Tinchy by far. Here's the official version:

#WOMANCE <3

And while I'm at it, since I never featured it when Lady Leshurr unleashed it on Twitter during the summer, here's 'Female Fire' ft. Lioness & Mz. Bratt, produced by TruOmega as well as Greenmoney's take on Mz. Bratt's 'Selecta' that has been waiting in my inbox for months.

So, you thought that the ratio of Nicki Minaj-related posts should decrease with the release of "Pink Friday"? Sorry to disappoint some of you, but they're not.

Ricky Blaze is re-releasing his 'Feel Free' as it will appear on his "My Name is Ricky Blaze" album slated for a release next year, milking out the last drop of the song with a new verse from Jim Jones, Nicki's contribution is still however the same one from like two years back, the same brilliant one (and one of my personal Nicki-verses of all time); "Step your cookies up, I go get you a ladder". Epic.

Also, the founder of the best bacon in the world, Crossfaded Bacon that is, Emynd has laid his hands on Trey Songz & Nicki's 'Bottoms Up' and created a nasty good Atlanta bass remix. Enjoy!

At first my intention was to review KanYe West's fifth studio album "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" today, only to realize that it's a complete impossible task. Not only because I have a heavy eye infection and spent most of the day waiting at the doctors, no the only word I can write about it is: masterpiece and I can't fill up a post with that word repeated 10 000 times can I? Esp. not after the book about "Pink Friday" yesterday, or well, it would have been fun to actually post something off like that.

But I'm not, and you know yesterday Pitchfork gave the album a perfect 10 and last week Rolling Stone gave it 5 out of 5 and nothing more needs to be said about it really. "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" is a masterpiece that you should listen to, not read about.

Instead let's move forward, after all, KanYe is not done yet, no early next year he and Jay-Z will release their collaborative album "Watch the Throne" and early this morning today 'That's My Bitch' dropped in my inbox featuring La Roux and with Q-tip behind the production.

And since I'm already on both La Roux and KanYe, enjoy a little inbox find from last week, the Elly Jackson-featured remix from the 12" of Chromeo's new single 'Hot Mess' as well as one of the possible best joints off T.I.'s upcoming album "No Mercy", 'Welcome to the World' featuring KiD CuDi and his grand mentor.

Hot, strong and smart bitches tend to make my heart race with excitement, it have always been that way but when the name Onika Tanya Maraj aka. Nicki Minaj comes to mind, my heart does an extra spin around the F1 track. Nicki have managed to take a special place in me being that musical chameleon with her multiple voices, animated raps and witty lyrics and the anticipation on her debut album "Pink Friday" has been sky high, in fact, I haven't been this heated for a album release in years.

Let's begin with the fact that a debut album is no easy task, especially for someone like Nicki who has been riding on a crazy hype for the last two years, slam dunked the award shows without an actual album, who has broke record after record, like being the first female rapper with 7 entries on Billboard Hot 100, being the first female emcee to have the top rap song on Billboard, being the first female to ever enter MTV's "Top 10 MC's List" among others. She has been on everyone's lips and has been featured on all major collabos that has been released the past year from Trina, Trey Songz, Ludacris, Usher, Diddy, Mariah Carey, Lil Wayne, Rihanna, Drake, Sean Kingston, Gyptian, Gucci Mane, KanYe West, M.I.A., Jay Sean, Keyshia Cole and the list goes on and on.

Nicki has surely paved the way for women in hip hop but with that comes a price, there's a heavy boulder on her shoulders with this debut, possible the heaviest one the carry for all the people releasing albums this year, cause if she fails, would the world be ready to push another female rapper forward the same way in the next coming five years? Would someone take the risk to give the Lore'ls or LoLa Monroes out there a major deal? Probably (and sadly) not and we would experience another backlash for women and rap, once again.

The album opens with 'I'm the Best', Nicki's chronicle journey from underground rapper to border-line mainstream artist, which takes off back in 2007 when Nicki came out with the "Playtime's Over" mixtape and "The Come Up DVD", you know when she rapped over Lil' Mama's 'Lipstick' with her 'Watchaknow About Me?' and over Lil' Kim's 'The Jump Off' and her journey and struggle towards the top via Cash Money, Young Money and Sylvia Rhone's Universal. How she switched her style to gain the money and fans, how she fighting for the girls an the line "So all my bad bitches I can see your halo" over the Kane Beatz signed production gives me goosebumps for real. Nicki also ties her old self with her "new" one in 'Dear Old Nicki', an answer to the people (and herself) missing the old Nicki from back in the day, prior the Barbie-wave and huge success.

Yes, the top is lonely and also comes with hate from former queens. Lil' Kim had been up Nicki's ass for months until the reply (now confirmed during an interview Nicki did with Angie Martinez on Hot 97 during the past weekend) finally came a couple of weeks ago with the absolutely mental 'Roman's Revenge' on the best production Swizz Beatz has ever made. A reply where Nicki transforms into her rude and crazy character Roman Zolanski and together with Eminem's alter ego Slim Shady they give Lil' Kim a good run for her money and this track is one of my top fives faves off the album, no doubt.

And the wrath of Nicki Minaj doesn't end there, far from, no on 'Did It on 'Em' (produced by Bangladesh and another one of the top five songs), Nicki literary takes a huge shit on the rest of the competition:

"Pink Friday" can be seen as different segment of songs. One of the groups is the collaborations where we find Drake on the T-Minus-produced 'Moment 4 Life', the J.R. Rotem-produced Rihanna collabo 'Fly' and of course, 'Blazin' featuring KanYe West with Drew Money behind the production steez. All these three collaborations are absolutely stellar and all would easily work as individual singles and last night during the AMA's Nicki revealed that 'Moment 4 Life' will be an upcoming single:

Then, as another block we have the actual already released singles, 'Right Thru Me', 'Your Love' and 'Check It Out' ft. Will.I.Am. All very mellow and commercial. Two of them samples popular songs from the 1980's, from mine and Nicki's childhood. 'Check It Out' samples Buggles old 'Video Killed the Radio Star' and 'Your Love' Annie Lennox 'No More I Love You's' and "Pink Friday" is a true child of the 1980's. It's filled with references to the music that was popular when we, the generation X grew up. But Nicki updates all these classic to something contemporary and new for the generations that comes after X, like Madonna's material girls and strive for money in the lovely and catchy 'Muny' produced by Oak and Papa Justifi:

Best is possible the newest interpretation of the Big Pink's huge 'Dominoes' from last year in hers and J.R. Rotem's 'Girls Falls Like Dominoes', which sort of is an ode to all her female fans and conquering heroines. A full force womance anthem and the perfect finish which wraps the album up beautifully:

So, are there any bad tracks then? Yes a couple, it's not Nicki's fault on 'Last Chance' thou, it's the production by Drew Money and feature from Natasha Bedingfield who ruins it for me as it sounds just like it was left over from Lil Wayne's "Rebirth" and I've never been a crazy fan of 'Blow Ya Mind' either, it's just way too messy to make any sense. But on the other hand, another of the upcoming singles 'Save Me' makes up for that big time, simply love the production even thou I miss something from Chase & Status, just picture what a great match it would have been after the 'Saxon/Mad House'-thing from Rihanna's "Rated R" last year.

I've seen a couple of lukewarm reviews of the album from some male journalists and well, I can understand why they're not buying fully into this Barbie-concept and highly commercial album, esp. not in the standard edition (13 tracks) as the bonus tracks (which makes the grand total of 19 if you include the iTunes bonus and Best Buy-bonuses: the Swizz Beatz-produced 'Catch Me' & 'Wave Ya Hand') makes the album whole and complete. Male journalists in their mid 30's/40's are also not the primal target audience, "Pink Friday" is for the girls, the barbz and the fellow sisters. For good and bad, while Lil' Kim snatched the men with her sexual explicit raps, Nicki traps them with her talent (and assets, like the epic Men's Magazine shoot) but the lyrical content and the album message is for the girls. It's made for the girls with love, the love from a big sister and the love from a fellow sister.

And the world today needs an agitator like Nicki Minaj, her millions of minions are proof enough. Lil Kim and Foxy had Biggie and Jay-Z, Nicki exists on her own. She's her own subject and that may also the reason why Lil Wayne is not present on "Pink Friday" at all. Perhaps a feature from Weezy would have been the final piece that is missing from the puzzle to call "Pink Friday" a masterpiece, but it's minor, I can definitely live without it. I rather see Nicki stand on her own two feet and according to me, she stands tall. Without Lil' Kim, Missy Elliott and Foxy Brown there would be no Nicki but she switches up everything they did back in the 1990's to the max with her own interpretation and real life stories and manage the task that no female rapper has done before, be a sex kitten the same time while she's rapping about actual content. Nicki is not either or, she's everything and both. She's the role model I hope my future children could have. You know, someone who tells the kids they should stay in school, someone who dares to be her cooked out self, someone who turns Black Friday into Pink for breast cancer awareness.

But well, some might say that "Pink Friday" is just as plastic and glitzy like Nicki's Barbie-thing. And yes, it might be highly commercial and sellable but bashing her just for the reason that she wants to earn and earns money? I wonder when the same critique will be forwarded to KanYe West, Diddy Pops and the rest of the lot... "Pink Friday" could easily be the album of the year, no question, but I can understand why some might think it's playing a bit too much on the safe side even if it's slightly psych ward from time to time.

But one thing stands clear, Nicki is a unique voice in the modern hip hop flora with her diversity and ability to jump on almost everything and hopefully she's already moved onto the next album, which will hopefully showcase more of her insane voice control and switch ups as well as her charisma and vocal style. Hopefully she will give more room for Roman Zolanski and his mother Martha and the rest of her character library but I fully get why "Pink Friday" is the real Onika on the mic most of the times.

Yes, unlike my male dittos I dare to rate "Pink Friday" five hearts out of five possible. Why? Well, Nicki's in a league of her own, the _only_ one playing the field at the same pace at the moment might be KanYe West, and with that I have to end this with a line from Nicki's verse on KanYes 'Monster': "You could be the King but watch the Queen conquer" and it's like that famous wall writing "Sometimes the King is a woman" by New York City Street Artist James De La Vega. Nicki is the King and Queen (and the ninja, the boss, the Harajuku Barbie, Cookie, Roman Zolanski, Martha etc.) in one, all hail Nicki Minaj.

It's time for another brilliant video from Kakan & Julia's webseries for the national Swedish Television and this time their topic is the sell out from the public sector to the private with their new company Kakan & Julia AB. Get ready for some bed soars, ethnic cleansing and some soft porn from the 1990's complete with satin sheets and all:

Too many good releases will be hitting the shelves and the web shops tomorrow, or how about Nicki Minaj's debut album "Pink Friday", KanYe West's masterpiece "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" and of course Robyn's third and final part in the "Body Talk" album-series "Body Talk pt.3".

And the third part must be the best one of them all as the album features five of the best songs from pt. 1 and 2 as well as five new ones, all creating Robyn's best work yet.

Among the five brand new ones there's the beautiful 'Call Your Girlfriend' which apply to the former men in my life in so many ways it's absolute ridic, the first listen I actually started to cry. Yes, been there, too many times, being that other woman that is, having the conversation about him getting things straight with the girlfriend:

Robyn's also back working with Max Martin (who did her smash hit 'Show Me Love') on 'Time Machine' but the track that caught most of my attention is actually the iTunes-bonus, a remix by Diplo and Stenchman featuring the mighty Spoek Mathambo of THE best track from the first part, the brilliant 'Dancehall Queen':

Speaking off Spoek for that matter, he finished off his North American Tour Friday's together with his live band Mshini Wam (Richard The Third- machines, JakobSnake - drums and Nic Van Reenen - guitar) and if you missed out, well here's a lil' piece of gold captured on film from when they hit the Red Bull Studio in Cape Town earlier this year:

Also, lookout for Spoek to be featured on 'The Monkey', a track off Adam Tensta's upcoming album "Scared Of The Dark" which will drop early next year.

The day has come, it's now officially Pink Friday and Nicki Minaj's debut album is out on the shelves, at least in Germany, the rest of us has to wait until Tuesday but last night Nicki, for the third time this year, paid David Letterman's Late Show a visit for a live performance of her latest solo-single 'Right Thru Me':

Hi y'all, I've been a bit silent today, but I'm still in a minor chock from last night. Found out early this morning that the thing that happened was that a child decided to take it's life by jumping in front of the train, then end up somewhere on our yard, which explain all policemen with flash lights, dogs, the copter and drama. A real tragedy and I passed by the memorial earlier today by accident. So so sad, take care of yourself and your loved ones, that's all I have to say. Like for real.

With that off my chest, oh yes, I am gonna serve up another Nicki Minaj-related post... Yesterday NME put up this track for free download rom UK's first lady of dancehall, Lady Chann but in .wav-form and I hate .wav since my .mp3 does not support the format so well, I decoded it.

On 'Dun You' Lady Chann jumps on Nicki's 'Your Love' and she actually stretches it to make it sound a bit more similar to the original that Drew Money sampled, as she replaces Nicki's chorus with the melody of the original one from Annie Lennox' 'No More I Love You's' and it's not bad, not bad at all.

Fuck, due to the massive train accident just outside our house earlier tonight I missed out on when Nicki Minaj phoned into Westwood's show on BBC 1Xtra, the main reason I actually listened to the show in the first place, Seriously, Westwood is too old, he's acting like damn Martha Stewart these days, just chatting all over the person he's interviewing like he did tonight with Tiger and what was up with the tech tonight? Felt like damn student radio?

Shit, I'm still shaky, the accident was so damn scary, the sound from the train was like it rammed our house (our house is just below the tracks) and 10 seconds after that the police helicopter was just outside my window (I mean like a hand-length away) about to crash into our house. However it didn't and the train didn't crash either, but someone got hit by the train and flew into our garden so the police has now searched it with the copter and dogs, hopefully everything went well.

Okay, nuff of the drama, let's get bizzack to Nicki, if you haven't figured it out yet "Pink Friday" leaked early this morning in one form, not the legit one (as it features 'Hello, Good Morning' and 'Massive Attack') so don't bother, pre-order the real deal instead but since they already are out everywhere on the interwebz, listen to the collaborations with KanYe West and Rihanna below.

The song with RiRi is the J.R. Rotem-produced 'Fly' and Nicki has said that "This song is a female empowerment song. But then again, it’s not specific to just women. It speaks about flying, soaring high in the face of every single solitary adversity that comes your way" and RiRi beautifully chants: "I came to win, to fly, to conquer, to thrive/ I came to win, to survive, to prosper, to rise:

The second track is the supposedly Drew Money-produced 'Blazin' with KanYe West and oh my, I don't know what else to say other that they both went hard on it:

There's no question that Lethal Bizzle's 'Pow' aka. 'Forward Riddim', produced by D'Explicit, is one of the best grime tracks ever made but isn't it also a bit hilarious that Bizzle has to update it for 2011 to gain some hype? Talk about living off old merits?

However, I'm not gonna complain, I take tunes like 'Pow' over the new grime any day and 'Pow 2011' just premiered on Tim Westwood's show on BBC's 1Xtra and features Chipmunk, Wiley, Kano, JME, Ghetts, P Money and 2Face:

'Pow 2011' will be released the 13th of December and will be Bizzle's attempt to get an Christmas Number 1 in the UK Charts.

Here's the original (off the 2nd release I think) if you weren't around back in 2004:

The La Vida Locash-crew are back it again with a brand new video in their Kakan & Julia humour/music-webseries for the national Swedish Television. This time Kakan and Julia get tangled up in a sweaty catfight:

And if you missed their previous clip 'Champagne-vaskning' about the absolute ridiculous phenomenon "vaska" (brat behaviour for ordering in a expensive bottle (or bottles) of champagne, but not for drinking, just to get the pleasure asking the staff to pour it down the drain), here you go, the word brilliant doesn't even begin to cover how great this one is:

The remix of True Tiger's & P Money's huge 'Slang Like This' premiered around midnight last night on Logan Sama's show on Kiss FM. The remix features Newham Generals and OG's Blacks and will be featured on the re-release of the single the 19th of December and there will also be a new video made for this.

And speaking of remixes, here's a nice Soudcloud find I did the other day, or well, I would like to call it a blend rather than a remix since Mr. Leub just laid Tempa T's 'Next Hype' over Sukh Knight's intrumental. However, until Tempz will release some thing new I'm gonna enjoy:

It's not even a week left until Nicki Minaj's debut album "Pink Friday" will be released but still, no leak in sight which concludes that Nicki works with the best. Here's today's rundown the tracklist which is about 'Here I Am':

'Here I am' is the 2nd song I recorded for the album. It was originally going to be called "Letter to the Media". I felt there were things I needed to get off my chest. I changed it because after listening over and over, it sounded as tho it could apply to an intimate relationship as well. It's funny..., this song is probably the last song people would expect to here from me but it has to be in my top 3 faves on the album. I'd listen to this song for hours on the plane or at home and pray for the day when I'd truly feel accepted. For me. Not for who everyone thinks I am. Not for who people want me to be. But for me. Here I am. Hate it or love it. Here I am. I've given all I had to give. I fought. I failed. I won. I cried. I laughed. I screamed. I'm ready. Not perfect by any stretch of the imagination. But Here I Am..

Via HHC comes another track off T.I.'s upcoming, re-titled since the king is back in the cage, album "No Mercy" which drops the 7th of December. The track is called 'That's All She Wrote' and features Eminem who also produced it.

Here's also the official tracklist with the rest of the album features:

I'm well humbled to present the world premiere of this, cause you now, this is the next level shit right here, the official video for Mash Up International & Gnucci Banana's infamous, and prolly one of my top ten fave songs of 2010 'Animal'. The video is made by Fajta and if you don't shake your tail-feather and go bananas to it, well I guess your only excuse must be that you're dead:

BOOM BOOM!!! The .mp3 is now downloadable off the Soundcloud below, just hit that magic arrow and let the singalaong-o-rama begin!

This was unexpected one might think? But no, actually not since Lil' Kim talked about this collaboration with Keri Hilson back in July during an interview HollywoodTV saying: "I'm doing a collaboration right now in the studio with Keri Hilson. I'm so excited! This is for her album though. So you might be hearing that song really soon. Shout out to Polow. I love you Polow. Cause he did the track." and well here it is, called 'Buy You' off Keri's upcoming sophomore album "No Boys Allowed" that drops the 21st of December.

What can I say, it was about time that Kimmie actually came out with something other than cheap shots aimed at Nicki Minaj! During the last week I've been listening to old Kim, like the "Notorious" and "La Bella Mafia" and her contribution on this, is pretty... lame. I hate to say it, it's a decent track in style of every independent womance-track out there, but compared with Nicki's flow Kim got nothing. Yes, I also hate the endless comparisons between the girls in the game but this time I actually thinks it's legit.

Kim, I love you but if you're gonna stay on top, it actually requires making an effort not just running your mouth.

Today's entry is about 'Blazin', the track off Nicki's album where KanYe West returns the favour since Nicki completely tore that 'Monster'-track up for him:

On Blazin I worked with Music and Fashion Icon KanYe West. His verse is absolutely amazing. The song makes u feel like ur flying to another realm. It takes over your mind for 5 minutes and forces u to get lost in a melodic, whimsical world. It feels like I'm blazin.

Hail Mary full of grace!!! I can't contain myself, about to cream my panties this very instant! You see, I've been waiting for this for something that feels like forever but now, the wait is over and this new week couldn't have had a better start!

Cause it's finally time for all club gorillas to pet the parrot and rumble in the jungle with Mash Up International and Gnucci Banana to their infectious and absolute amazing remake of Miike Snow's smash hit 'Animal':

Today's entry of the "Pink Friday Diaries" is about the highly anticipated collaboration between the Young Money Queen and Prince Drizzy Drake called 'Moment 4 life':

is about 2 kids that grew up on the same block. They shared their dreams of making it as rappers. They laughed together, they cried together. One day they realize that their dreams have come to fruition. Though they know all things come to an end, they celebrate. They wish that they could have this moment 4 LIFE.

Oh yeah barbz, 'Moment 4 Life' features Drake! I was really looking forward to our collaboration and it lived up to every one of my expectations. It feels like a marriage made in heaven ;)Haha, nice pass to the fake marriage they set up on Twitter a couple of moths back.

I know, I'm going hard with all these Nicki Minaj-posts but hey, this is one of my most anticipated albums in years, think the last time I was this excited about a release was when Lil' Kim unveiled her "La Bella Mafia" or something, and I love this "Pink Friday Diaries"-thing, it sort of feels like opening a Christmas calender. Today's chapter reads 'Save Me':

This song feels like a soundtrack to a movie. It paints a vivid picture of a girl who has it all but still feels very much alone. She's turned into a monster and pushed the one person who truly loved her away. She drives hundreds of miles, falls to her face sobbing, and begs him to save her.

Yes, I just had to post that picture from Nicki Minaj's cover story from the latest issue of Billboard, simply amazing, I'm azzmerized.

I guess the official video for Keyisha Cole's first single 'I Ain't Thru' ft. Nicki Minaj off her upcoming newly retitled album, "Calling All Hearts" (dropping on December 21st) got liberated a bit early as it has HHC-tags all over but well, enjoy:

And since is X-Factor night, here's also the special UK-remix version of Nicki & Will.I.Am's 'Check It Out' featuring Cheryl Cole (who brings practically nothing to the table):

After the whole "Today Show"-debeacle KanYe West is currently in Dubai and now it's currently Saturday and right on time for the weekly edition of the #GOODFridays, this week featuring Talib Kweli & Consequence: